Read an Excerpt
The African American Guide to the Bible
By H. C. Felder, Jarvis J. Ross AuthorHouse
Copyright © 2015 Dr. H. C. Felder
All rights reserved.
ISBN: 978-1-5049-4767-1
CHAPTER 1
Introduction To Part I
While I think you're sincere, you're making a mistake in assuming that you're superior to me because you simply accepted a bunch of ancient myths that you were taught and told not to question. In an age of science and reason, I find it amazing that some people are still blinded by these false religious teachings. — excerpt from a letter written to my wife by her father.
The Bible is the best-selling book in the history of mankind. It may also be the most maligned and criticized book as well. It has served as the foundation for laws and governments from ancient time to recent times. The mere word "Bible" often evokes high emotions. Sometimes in reverence, other times in scorn. It has been the source of constant legal battles in the public arena. It has been called God's words for all humanity. It has also been called a book of outdated mythology and fabricated stories. People have banned and burned it throughout history. Although most people have never read the Bible, people all around the world have an opinion of the Bible.
There is a commonly held belief that the Bible has been changed throughout history. Virtually every non-Christian religious group believes this. The reasoning is clear. For some religious groups, the Bible becomes untrustworthy because opposing religious beliefs would not stand a chance if they honestly acknowledged that the Bible is the inspired word of God. They claim that the Bible is a fallacy work penned by corrupt hands to take advantage of gullible people. They say, people need a newer, purer, fresh revelation from God.
Non-religious groups will dismiss the Bible as fairy tales and mythology. They will ignore it as unscientific and unreliable. Their reasoning here is also clear. If there is no God of the Bible, there can be no revelation from God and no accountability to Him. Furthermore, if there is no God, there can be no miracles. If you reject miracles and God, you must dismiss the Bible as well since it is a book filled with miracles performed by God. If you reject miracles in the Bible, then the greatest miracle in the history of mankind — the redemptive work of Christ — is dismissed. For atheists, agnostics, and other opposing groups, the supernatural must be rejected because it is outside the realm of our physical senses.
Why So Much Attention To One Book?
The answer is simple. The Bible claims authority as the inerrant Word of God. This statement alone should explain why some love it while others hate it. Some long to hear the Word of the Lord, while others want to silence it.
The expressed question in this section is "Why trust the Bible?" We will address that issue as we examine the validity of the Bible and explore its content and structure. We will also provide evidence for its reliability and inspiration. Simply stated, the purpose of this section is to give good reasons to trust the Bible as the Word of God.
Structural Overview
The Bible is composed of sixty–six books written by thirty-nine authors over a period of 1,500 years. It is divided into two main sections called the Old Testament and the New Testament. There have been various ordering and groupings over the years. The focus of this section is the modern Protestant Bible.
Old testament
The ordering of the books of the Old Testament are topical (subject) rather than chronological (arranged order). The modern Old Testament is divided into four sections. They are the Law, Poetry, History, and Prophets (see Table 1.1).
The Law constitutes the first five books of the Bible — Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, and Deuteronomy. These books were written by Moses and are arranged chronologically. They were written between 1300 and 1200 BC.
The History books consist of Joshua, Judges, Ruth, 1 Samuel, 2 Samuel, 1 Kings, 2 Kings, 1 Chronicles, 2 Chronicles, Ezra, Nehemiah, and Esther. These books give the history of the nation of Israel in the land of Canaan.
The Poetry books consist of Job, Psalms, Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, and Song of Solomon. They contain both poetry and wisdom. The Psalms are praises to God while the Proverbs are the words of wisdom.
The final section of the Old Testament is the Prophets. They are a group of seventeen books broken up into two parts. The first five books are the Major Prophets while the remaining twelve books are the Minor Prophets (see Table 1.2). The Major and Minor designations have nothing to do with the significance of the prophet themselves but are about the size of the book. Books by Major Prophets are considerably longer than Minor Prophets.
New testament
The New Testament is divided into four sections. They include the Gospels, History, the Epistles, and Prophecy (see Table 1.3). The word Gospel means "Good News." The Gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John all proclaim the good news of the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ. The four gospels provide multiple testimonies to the events surrounding Jesus. Matthew, Mark, and Luke are called the "Synoptic Gospels" because they follow a common story line. John's Gospel is different because it focuses on fewer incidents with detail. In fact, ninety-two percent of the information contained in John is not found in the other Gospels.
The History section is comprised of the book of Acts. It contains the Acts of the Apostles as they carried the good news to the world.
The Epistles are letters written by the Apostles with one possible exception. The Apostle Paul wrote the largest group of Epistles. The letters are arranged first by letters written to individuals (see Table 1.4). Within each group, the Epistles are organized by size. The Epistles written to churches are Romans, 1 Corinthians, 2 Corinthians, Galatians, Ephesians, Philippians, Colossians, 1 Thessalonians, and 2 Thessalonians. The Epistles written to individuals are 1 Timothy, 2 Timothy, Titus, and Philemon. The author of the Book of Hebrews is currently unknown to us though some have historically attributed it to the Apostle Paul. The Apostles James, Peter, John, and Jude have also written Epistles. The books are named after the Apostles and include the Books of James, 1 Peter, 2 Peter, 1 John, 2 John, 3 John, and Jude. They are also arranged in order of size with the larger books appearing first.
The final Book of the Bible is the book of Revelation and it is the only book of prophecy in the New Testament. It contains the prophecies of Jesus revealed to the Apostle John. It discloses the second coming of Jesus Christ and the catastrophic events of the end times called eschatology.
CHAPTER 2
Content Overview
To understand the Bible, it is important to comprehend its content. This section will give a brief, high-level overview of some of the Bible's events that are more significant.
The Old Testament
The Old Testament begins with the book of Genesis, which begins with a historical account of God's creation. In Genesis, God creates the heavens and the earth, all the animals, the air, and the waters. God ends His creation with the creation of humankind — man and woman. God made them in His image. This does not mean that God has a body. Instead, it means that they reflected God's image in the possession of intelligence, emotions, and free will. However, free will is useless unless there is a power of choice.
God presented Adam and Eve with a decision by forbidding them to eat from the tree of "Knowledge of Good and Evil" — one of the many trees in the Garden of Eden. They chose to obey their own desire rather than God's command, leading to the Fall of Mankind. The perfect union between God and man was severed. Fortunately, for humanity, God already had a plan to restore that relationship.
By the sixth chapter of Genesis, Adam's descendants had become so wicked that God decided to destroy mankind. God's judgment excluded Noah and his family. Noah, his family, and all of the animals were gathered together into the Ark. God then destroyed the earth using a great flood. However, humanity would replenish the world through Noah's sons, Shem, Ham, and Japheth. Everyone alive today is related to Noah and his three sons just as everyone alive is related to Adam and Eve.
Genesis 10 gives a historical account of how the earth became populated by the descendants of Noah. This becomes paramount to our later discussions.
Noah was a righteous man by God's declaration, but still possessed Adam's propensity (sinful nature) to disobey God.
The destruction of humanity before the flood was only a temporary solution to the problem of sin. God is all knowing so the fall of man did not catch Him by surprise. God had a plan of redemption that would bring His Son Jesus into the world to restore the relationship Adam broke. Nevertheless, the plan would unfold and fulfill through time.
One of the first steps in God's plan of redemption was the "call" of a man named Abraham to follow Him. Abraham was faithful to the point of risking the life of his son Isaac (Genesis 22). From Abraham, God would produce a great nation. God also promised Abraham that his descendants would grow rapidly into vast numbers compared to the stars and sands of the sea (Genesis 22:17).
All nations of the world and the nation of Israel would be blessed through Abraham because God's Son would come through his lineage. It would happen much later, however. When Genesis ends, the small nation of Israel become slaves in Egypt where they grew in numbers according to God's promise.
In the book of Exodus, God delivers His people from Egyptian bondage with a mighty hand. Through Moses, God performed numerous miracles. To make sure that Israel would never forget what God did, He instituted some sacred observances. The Passover became a significant rite and remains part of the Jewish culture today.
In the book of Leviticus, God's holiness is revealed. Transgressions were not taken lightly because of the purity of God's nature. In fact, the wages of sin then and now were death. Because of the penalty of death due to man's inability to keep the law, God established animal sacrifices to make amends for their sinful deeds and provide forgiveness.
Animal sacrifices might seem barbaric to us today, but not if you understand God's holiness. For God to look the other way from sin and pardon man by a wave of the hand would be an indictment against the righteousness of God. The fact that death is the result of transgressions against God's holy nature puts God in a category above all other gods. Therefore, His laws were designed to align man with His righteousness and holiness. Sin against a holy and righteous God is not a trite casual thought!
The book of Numbers records the journey that the Israelites took on their way to the Promised Land. However, during their journey, they began to doubt. They became fearful that they could not defeat the inhabitants of the Promised Land even with the help of God. As a result, God judged them by excluding unbelievers from entering the Promise Land. Only the faithful Joshua and Caleb and their posterity entered the Promised Land. God blessed them to conquer their enemies and accomplished His promise under the military leadership of Joshua.
In the book of Deuteronomy, God forms a covenant with His people, Israel. A covenant here is an arrangement between God and His people. Covenant relationship with God had certain benefits. He promised to bless and prosper them. He promised to provide for them and protect them. He promised all these things as long as they were careful to obey His laws. God carefully constructed what He expected from His people to maintain their covenant relationship with Him. One of the primary tenants was they must worship Him and no other idol god.
If Israel failed to keep their part of the covenant, God declared certain curses. They would not prosper and He would allow death and disease to invade their lives. He would also judge them by permitting their enemies in other lands to capture and subject them to slavery.
When the nation became comfortable in their new home, they started to neglect God, their Deliverer. They disobeyed the command and began worshipping the gods of the inhabitants of the lands around them. Consequently, because they wanted to be like the other nations, Israel divided into two nations, the Northern Kingdom, Israel and the Southern Kingdom, Judah. Although God sent prophets, admonishing them to repent and return to Him, both nations rebelled against God.
The Books of the Prophets contain God's warnings to return to the One and only God and serve Him. The Prophets reminded them of the curses recorded in Deuteronomy associated with disobeying the Covenant. Regardless of the admonitions uttered by the Prophets and God's love and peace given to them, they continued to disobey. Nevertheless, God's Covenant and love promised the coming of a Peacemaker, who would make final peace with God, Israel, and all the nations. He would be called the Messiah!
Despite their backslidings away from Him, God continued to pursue Israel. God called them His bride, and their actions of seeking other gods an act of adultery. God still tolerated them and gave many warnings through His Prophets, but God's patience would eventually end. Although God is longsuffering in nature, His toleration of their sinful behavior ended and He pronounced judgment upon them. The judgment was in the form of curses mentioned in Deuteronomy. Israel went into captivity among their enemies in foreign lands.
Although God punished His people, His punishment was a means of correction, and He continued to display love for them. He made it clear that His punishment was temporary and that one day He would restore them to His Promise. Although most were killed and enslaved by conquering nations, God kept His Promise to the Patriarchs and reserved a remnant that would return to the Promised Land. They were never completely destroyed!
As the Old Testament comes to a close, there is a period of silence for four hundred years. God did not speak to His people! The silence was not about God's business with other people and other matters. He was preparing the way for a New Covenant through the Messiah, Jesus Christ.
The New Testament
The Old Testament told the story of the Fall of Man and God's plan of redemption. In the New Testament, the Messiah would make things right and bring peace between Him, Israel, and all Nations. God preserved a remnant of His people through which He would bring the Messiah. The Prophets predicted the Messiah coming to restore God's people and the Psalms gave details about how He would rule.
The New Testament begins with the Gospels proclaiming the "Good News" of God's plan of redemption. The stage was now set and the plan would swing into action. The Gospels tell us about God's solution to man's problem. Death, sickness, and all enemies of humanity orchestrated through Satan would meet their match in the person of Jesus Christ.
The Gospels paint a vivid picture of Jesus. He was born of a virgin (Matthew 1). He performed countless miracles. He healed sickness and fed multitudes with only a few fish and a few loaves of bread. He calmed the storm on the Sea of Galilee (Matthew 8:26)), walked on water (Matthew 14:23), and even raised the dead (John 11). They accused Christ of blasphemy for claiming He was God and crucified Him. However, that is the beginning, not the end because He rose from the dead. He then empowered and commissioned His Disciples to spread the Good News of the Gospel message.
The resurrection of Jesus Christ was the ultimate miracle that fulfilled God's Covenant Promise. That promise was the Messiah, Jesus Christ. Death, hell, and the grave were defeated! The only qualified person, Jesus the Christ, paid the final sacrifice for the sins of humanity.
The Gospels are a record of the New Covenant established by Jesus. The Old Covenant dealt with the law and animal sacrifice. The New Covenant centered on the sacrifice of Jesus on a cruel cross. His New Covenant is His body and blood, shed and given for the forgiveness of sins (Matthew 26:26-28). Jesus was the Lamb of God, slain from the foundation of the earth who took away the sins of the world (John 1:29). Animal sacrifices were no longer necessary. The promised sacrifice was made.
(Continues...)
Excerpted from The African American Guide to the Bible by H. C. Felder, Jarvis J. Ross. Copyright © 2015 Dr. H. C. Felder. Excerpted by permission of AuthorHouse.
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